Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Every presidential candidate inspires voters to ask themselves, "If this person is elected, what's the worst that could plausibly happen?".... So I got to thinking. What's the worst thing that could plausibly happen if Ron Paul wins?...

"Don't ask why I chose him. It's obvious. The idea of him in the White House makes a lot of the people reading this post uneasy. Despite my libertarian sympathies, there is even a part of me that has always felt, without ever having thought it through, that putting Paul in the White House would be the biggest gamble of all the possible candidates running in the GOP primary. His tenure might have tremendous upsides: zero imprudently launched wars, a resurgence of civil liberties, more transparency. But he's also a radical who wants to see more fundamental change than any other candidate, he is least beholden to the political establishment, which constrains the behavior of conventional pols, and we've never seen him operate as an executive....

"What's the worst that Ron Paul could do? Try to get America back on the gold standard, only to find that he doesn't have the votes in Congress to do it? I am not just being funny. Though Paul has some radical domestic policy ideas, I just don't see any of them getting passed into law. And in foreign policy and national security matters, the areas where he would exercise the most unchecked discretion, he is the candidate you'd least expect to unwisely provoke or launch a war."